


Gasoline

by nottinghamroad



Category: The Magicians (TV), The Magicians - Lev Grossman
Genre: M/M, but like, but maybe not the w, definitely the first p, i thought it would be a pwp, it looks like there might be a second p, yeahhhhhhh
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-24
Updated: 2017-06-28
Packaged: 2018-11-18 17:50:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,255
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11295690
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nottinghamroad/pseuds/nottinghamroad
Summary: Quentin finds his way back to Fillory after being banished, and the first person he sees upon his return brings back old memories....(This is a mixture of book canon, the SyFy series canon, and good old fashioned fanon).





	1. you're coming back

**Author's Note:**

> ok so like
> 
> i've been reading the Magicians books and watching the series....I'm done with S1 of the series, and am halfway through the third book. 
> 
> and i'm quickly developing an obsession with Queliot. I know right, predictable!1!!!! 
> 
> I started this thinking it would take place after the end of book 2, where (mild spoilers) Quentin is banished from Fillory and Eliot kisses him before he leaves (hence the quote), and then Q has his own adventures and then comes back. They reunite, happy fun times ensue. Mostly PWP. But yeah it might take a different direction than that. 
> 
> ITS NOT MY FAULT, THE BRILLIANT BROKEN KINGS ARE TOGETHER AND I WILL SHOUT IT FROM THE ROOFTOPS. 
> 
> Long live the High King and the Bi King.

“Then Eliot hugged him, a long hug, and when he was done he kissed Quentin on the mouth. That Quentin felt.”  
\--The Magician King, chapter 57. 

Quentin stood at the entrance to Castle Whitespire, overwhelmed with the deluge of memory that had begun the moment he had crossed the drawbridge. It was a curious feeling, standing at the grand entrance, seemingly in the liminal space between his life as a middle-aged professor at Brakebills and his wild youth as a king of Fillory. He let his eyes travel over the carvings and paintings that decorated the grand entrance, and was surprised to see himself, Margo, and Eliot featured in a few of the newer-looking paintings in the center archway. Quentin took a few steps closer to the center archway, a few steps closer to what was now almost a decade in his past, his life as the Magician King, and his gaze settled on the most central painting adorning the center archway. 

It depicted, in heart-wrenching detail, Alice’s defeat of the Beast, and her subsequent transformation into a niffin. Quentin found himself unable to tear his eyes away from the painting. He waited for the familiar swooping emptiness to take over his consciousness and to plunge him into a depression that he would (almost) happily wallow in for a few days because it would bring her memory back, however briefly. 

But it didn’t come. His eyes traveled over the painting again and again, watching the moment that undid him in his most vulnerable years, the moment that ruined him and changed the way he saw the world, what felt like the worst day of his life. And the depression didn’t come. He felt something of a familiar ache in his heart, but it was a distant ache, one that felt so firmly rooted in his past self that he wondered if the grand entrance was not standing between his current and past lives, but perhaps a borderland leading to somewhere different entirely. 

He walked through the central archway and up to the foot of the grand staircase that wound its way up to the second floor where the quarters of the kings and queens of Fillory were. Quentin looked to the top of the staircase, at the junction where the handrail of the staircase met the railing of the second floor indoor balcony, and then he knew that the liminal space he was standing in was a precipice that would drop him into entirely new territory if he allowed it to.

“Eliot,” Quentin tried to form a complete sentence, but the High King of Fillory was framed--there was no other word for it--spectacularly by the second floor’s decorations, the sun rising behind him, and the rich oak railing upon which he rested his hands. Quentin had always been rather distracted by Eliot’s hands. They were larger than his by half, and Eliot had long, elegant fingers that cast magnificent spellwork and infiltrated Quentin’s dreams for reasons that had nothing to do with magic. 

“I thought you might be back.” Eliot’s voice was uncharacteristically soft. “It’s been awhile.” 

“I didn’t think I--” Quentin didn’t know how to finish the sentence. “I never thought I’d be, well. I taught, you know. For a long time, at Brakebills. I suppose it wasn’t that long. It was long enough. I took a job with a gang of hedge witches too, you know. It was really quite an adventure.” Quentin continued to babble and only noticed out of the corner of his eye that Eliot was descending the stairs slowly and deliberately, one at a time, his eyes fixed on Quentin. “The job itself was fine, I guess, I mean it got me back here, in something of a roundabout way, it’s a funny story that I’ve been meaning to--” 

Quentin was suddenly cut short. Eliot was at the base of the stairs (well, he wasn’t _technically_ , he was one step above Quentin, as he usually was, but that was beside the point, the point was Eliot was very, very close, and Quentin found himself unable to concentrate enough to finish his sentence). 

“What were you saying?” Eliot asked innocently, his rich brown eyes boring into Quentin’s. Quentin opened his mouth to speak and then closed it again, overwhelmed by what it felt like to be under Eliot’s intense gaze again. It was like you were suddenly the center of his universe, and at the same time unsure as to whether or not that was a good thing. Quentin felt exposed under Eliot’s stare, and again he waited for the familiar sweep of his youthful insecurities over him, the wondering whether or not he was good enough to merit the attention of someone as ethereal and transcendent as Eliot could be. Despite (or perhaps because of) Eliot’s tortured loneliness, he was still blindingly radiant to Quentin, and Quentin had long felt like the moon to Eliot’s brilliant sun. 

But no such descent of youthful insecurities came. Quentin still felt raw and exposed, but somehow the vulnerability of reflecting the light of such a gleaming person made him feel less terrified than he had anticipated. He met Eliot’s gaze briefly, but then he couldn’t help himself. He took in the High King’s appearance hungrily, appreciating as he always did the impeccable outfit choices that Eliot made, choices which Quentin knew were good but were still entirely a mystery to Quentin as to how to make them for himself. Eliot’s curly brown hair was always so perfect that Quentin often wondered if it had just arrived that way, fully formed, or if Eliot simply verbally told his hair what to do every morning and his hair obeyed. Quentin would not have put it past Eliot to discover or simply invent a spell like that. 

Quentin noticed an errant curl hanging in the middle of Eliot’s forehead, and he reached his hand up to smooth the curl back into place. It didn’t work, but Quentin didn’t care about the curl because he had heard (well, he thought he had heard….he _hoped_ he had heard) Eliot suck in a tiny breath when Quentin had touched his hair. 

It was a tiny intake of breath that sounded almost like a gasp.

Quentin wound Eliot’s curl around his index finger and rubbed the soft hair in between it and his thumb. It wasn’t the first time he had played with Eliot’s hair, but it was the first time he had done so stone-cold sober. It was electrifying. Quentin was afraid for a brief moment that he had accidentally begun to generate electricity through his fingers, but before he could unwind his finger from Eliot’s hair to make sure this wasn’t the case, Eliot had jerked forward, wound his hands in Quentin’s hair, and covered Quentin’s mouth with his own. 

It was at this moment that Quentin found himself unable to form a coherent thought for the third time that morning. Eliot’s lips were soft, unbearably soft and insistent and Quentin felt something in him stirring, a slight sense of deja vu from the last time they had kissed, which was right after he had been banished from Fillory.  
Tears sprang to Quentin’s eyes, and embarrassingly, rolled down his cheeks and met Eliot’s cheeks. 

The High King, his first friend at Brakebills, drew back once he felt the tear on his cheek. Eliot wiped the tears off of his cheek with his forefinger and stared at them for a moment, confused. He felt beneath his own eyes, then he looked up at Quentin, who had given up on trying to prevent further tears from falling, and was crying silently, hoping the moment would pass quickly. 

“You’re still the same high-strung supernerd you always were.” Eliot’s head was cocked to the side, watching Quentin cry with an inscrutable expression. Or maybe the expression was perfectly clear and Quentin just couldn’t read it, reading other people’s emotions had never been his discipline. 

“Shut up, it’s just the memory from the last time you--and then I had to--and then it was just _so fucking long_ , and now I’m back and you’re here, and it’s just a lot, okay?” Quentin scrubbed at his eyes with his hands, his face hot with embarrassment. He felt Eliot gently remove his hands from his face and take them into his own. His hands felt so small compared to Eliot’s. 

“I love high-strung supernerds. Even ones who literally never shut up about Vulcan rituals.” Eliot’s expression was somber as he spoke the phrase. He and Quentin met each other’s eyes, and Quentin couldn’t hold back a watery laugh. 

“It was relevant when we were first learning battle magic, I was making a connection, it really does help with your learning, you know,” Quentin explained, but he didn’t get far in the explanation before Eliot had pulled him in again and kissed him, taking a few steps backward up the stairs, dragging Quentin with him. Eliot broke them apart only to sink down into a seated position on the fifth stair up. He let his legs hang open suggestively, and looked up at Quentin through his eyelashes. 

“You are such a little shit,” Quentin shook his head, grinning, dropped his shoulder bag and straddled Eliot on the stairs. This was getting personal. Quentin could feel so much of Eliot from this position, and without thinking, ran his hands down Eliot’s arms, pausing on his lean (but still quite strong) biceps. The further they went like this, the harder it was going to be to write the experience off as another one of their shenanigans--a drunken romp, a kiss given in the heat of an emotional moment. Quentin took Eliot’s hands in his, and brought them to his heart. Eliot’s expression was enigmatic again. 

“Tell me…” Quentin ran his thumbs over the pads of Eliot’s hands. “Tell me you want this. Tell me you want me.” He met Eliot’s eyes, and the enigma melted into Eliot’s entirely recognizable “I-know-better-than-you” face. 

“You are a fucking nerd,” Eliot told him, and Quentin could have sworn he had said so fondly. For the third time, Eliot pulled Quentin towards him, and this time, Quentin was ready. He kissed Eliot with abandon, winding his hands in Eliot’s hair, and trying to put everything he couldn’t say out loud into the kiss. 

Eliot met and exceeded his enthusiasm, surging upwards and kissing Quentin rather spectacularly, as only befit the monarch with such a title. Before Quentin entirely knew what was happening, they had switched places, and Eliot was sitting on top of him on the stairs instead, barely breaking contact. 

Quentin had done his fair share of kissing in his life, and liked to think that he possessed a fair amount of skill in this particular area, but oh, god, _Eliot_. Kissing Eliot was completely unlike anything he had ever done. He had known this from brief previous experiences, but he had never really _known_ it. Eliot kissed with a razor sharp focus, systematically stripping away Quentin’s defenses, layer by layer, and fuck if it didn’t help that they were both growing hard in the process and Eliot kept grinding down on him as he worked, almost unconsciously, but if Quentin knew Eliot at all, it was definitely conscious. 

“Eliot!” Margo’s voice rang out from the upper floor, somewhat in the distance, and it took Quentin a moment to realize she had spoken because Eliot had not stopped kissing him, he was positively a man on a mission. 

“ELIOT!” Margo called again, only this time her voice was louder. “Eliot, where the fuck have you--oh.” 

It was an “oh” with a slight uptick, an “oh” that was very Margo, an “oh” where she had realized what she walked in on and was not upset about it. Eliot raised his head from kissing Quentin’s neck. 

“Daddy’s busy,” he informed her, making ‘shoo’ing motions with his hands. Margo gave what could only be described as a devilish giggle, but she wouldn’t leave. Quentin could feel his face turning flaming red. He lifted a hand as best he could from underneath Eliot and attempted a sort of backwards wave at Margo. 

“Hey, Margo,” 

“Hey, Q. Glad to have you back on this side of the multiverse.” Margo’s tone made Quentin think she might have actually meant that. “Look, boys,” she continued, “I don’t want to interrupt this reunion any more than you want to, but it can’t wait. You have five minutes to clean yourselves up, we’ve got company in the throne room.” And with that, she turned on her heel and left. 

“Fuck,” breathed Quentin, feeling the color in his face go down only slightly. 

“No, that’s later,” Eliot told him absently. He kissed Quentin again--twice, hard--and rolled off him. He stood, brushed off the dust from his clothes, and offered a hand to Quentin to help him stand up. Quentin took it. Eliot didn’t let go as they made their way to the throne room. 

And further, and further, and further….


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The petitioner in the throne room makes her case....
> 
> ....and Eliot begins to make his.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THANK YOU FOR READING AND FOR LEAVING SUCH WONDERFUL UPLIFTING COMMENTS. you're wonderful. 
> 
> It should be noted that in the books, Quentin's hair turns completely white at the end of book 1 after he is all done healing with some centaur-y folks. I saw great opportunity for fun prose in said hair, so as much as I love Jason Ralph's hair, we are going with Book Hair. it's iconic ok.
> 
>  
> 
> E rating will probably be earned next chapter. ;)

CHAPTER 2 

Eliot hoped to Ember that whoever the hell was begging for an audience with him in the throne room had an amazing fucking reason to be there, because otherwise he was _seriously_ losing cred as the High King if he was going to be interrupted in the middle of something like that again. He assumed his physical throne with as much grace as he could manage, and gazed regally downwards at the tottering old woman in front of him. 

Well, shit. He wasn’t much of a king if he couldn’t even have some patience and grace for old women. He let out a sigh, and allowed some of his petty frustration to slip away. He was peripherally aware of Quentin’s presence in the room behind him, but he tamped down that awareness very quickly before things got out of hand. 

“...I was seeking an audience with his Majesty before because I wanted an allowance to graze my sheep nearer to the castle, but then I witnessed the murder and the guards thought it was me, but your Majesty, if you don’t mind me saying, I’m not exactly the type to have the capacity for such an act, if you see what I’m saying.” The old woman was already in full flow, so Eliot tried to keep up as best he could. 

“Who died?” he asked, knowing full well she had probably already said who it was. 

“The archduke of the East,” the woman repeated, a slight air of annoyance in her voice. Eliot raised a regal eyebrow, letting her know he had heard the annoyance. She bowed her head deferentially. 

“Do we care about this archduke?” Eliot spoke out of the corner of his mouth to Margo. 

“Wars have been started over less,” Margo said, mostly under her breath. Eliot turned back to his petitioner. 

“What is your name, erm, gentle subject,” 

“Margaret,” the old woman informed him, inclining her head slightly. 

“Well then, Margaret, I will entreat you to tell the whole of your story to my court scribe, they will write it down in its entirety, and we will review your case and do what we can to find the real killer.” Eliot hoped this was enough to pacify her, he _so_ had other things to be doing right now. 

“You’re going to want my help,” Margaret said, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. 

“I have a good sense of when people are lying to me,” Eliot told her, “in fact, it’s almost a superpower. I believe you, you didn’t kill the archduke. We will figure it out.” 

“Not without my help you won’t,” Margaret’s expression was grim, “seeing as how I saw the killer and he saw me.” She coughed. “Well, is seeing me. Is continuing to see me.” 

“Goddammit,” Eliot cursed under his breath. “Start with the court scribe. They will put you in a special chamber once you’re done that’s impervious to all magic. It’s not the most comfortable place, but it’s humane, and you’ll be fine. We’ll come check on you.” 

“I don’t like the sound of her,” Margo told Eliot as the three of them left the throne room. “I know most tracking and stalker-y enchantments there are, I made a project out of it after the Margolem incident. None of it is fun, all of it is dangerous. Even for jetsetting monarchs such as ourselves.” 

“I can help,” Quentin finally piped up from behind the two of them. “I’ve gotten a fair bit of experience, you know, with more magic stuff. Tried out some big-ass spells and didn’t die, and all that. Including some extra fun ones using Myakovsky’s juiced-up coins from down South.” 

“We’ll need the scribe’s report first.” Eliot took out a piece of paper and set about enchanting it to return to him once the scribe’s report had been delivered to his throne room. It fluttered away, taking the shape of a lovely little origami crane. 

“You’ve gotten good at that,” Margo remarked, and Quentin nodded his agreement. 

“I know,” Eliot watched it fly away, pleased with himself. 

______________

Eliot never got tired of his balcony. The view of the valley below Whitespire would always be nothing short of inspiring, haters be damned. He stared out at the valley and watched a contingent of ravens fly in a strict formation through the trees. The fucking ravens were so show-offy, Eliot was sure it was mostly to make the other corvids jealous. He would have to seriously consider hosting a roundtable if this type of shit was going to continue. 

“This looks as good as I remember it did.” Quentin’s voice came from behind him, and Eliot bit the inside of his cheek. He raised a hand and curled his fingers forward a few times, beckoning Quentin towards him.

“It’s quite the power trip, staring out at everything the light touches, knowing it’s mine, and all that.” Eliot gestured around. Quentin stood next to him. Close to him. Eliot filed away that feeling of electricity between their barely-touching arms for later use. 

“But what about that shadowy land over there?” Quentin made a terrible attempt at imitating the voice of Simba. 

“That, my son, is the Darkling Woods, the stronghold of terrors known to no man, and bacchanals for only the bravest and most stout of heart.” Eliot lowered the pitch of his voice for the last phrase for dramatic effect, _basso profundo_.

Quentin laughed, moving closer to Eliot as he did so, so now their arms were touching. 

“Sunset will be soon,” remarked Eliot. 

“It’s nice from this balcony,” agreed Quentin. Eliot turned to look at him, and took in his face. His old friend had aged some, his mouth was adorned with laugh lines around the corners, and the place where his brows met when they furrowed had two deep grooves there. Quentin’s shockingly white hair was tied back into a neat bun at the base of his neck. If Eliot didn’t know Quentin, he would have thought he was an insufferable barista at a new, *~experimental~* coffee shop in town who was constantly fake-reading Proust but really reading Batman rerun comics. (Which was exactly Eliot’s type, but he would never admit this publicly). 

But Eliot did know Quentin. He _knew_ Quentin. And _fuck_ , he had missed him. His time on the High King’s throne without Quentin had been unspeakably lonely, even with Margo there. Margo was Eliot’s best friend, there was no doubt about that, but if they were going to get down to enneagram brass tacks, she was the solitary, self-preservation subtype, and Eliot was the desperately-needing-individual-attention-but-too-aloof-to-ask-for-it, sexual subtype. Margo loved Eliot and had always supported him, but was much more self-sufficient than Eliot could ever hope to be. 

And Quentin _saw_ Eliot in a way he had never been seen before. From the first time they had met at the entrance to Brakebills, Quentin had _seen_ Eliot. Not day-drunk, never knowing what the hell he had just snorted Eliot. Quentin saw High King Eliot from the day they met, and Eliot had not been able to put his finger on what that was until they arrived in Fillory and were crowned. 

Quentin saw what Eliot would become in Fillory, and Eliot had not known that vision, that unashamed belief in the best of him, was exactly what he needed until Quentin had been banished. 

Eliot took Quentin’s hand in his and kissed it. He looked up to see Quentin blushing, and he quirked a smile in the corner of his mouth. He turned Quentin’s hand over and kissed the palm. 

“El,” Quentin’s voice was soft, and sounded a tiny bit choked up. “We should, um.”

Eliot looked up at Quentin, who was hastily scrubbing away tears again from his rich brown eyes. Eliot took both of Quentin’s hands in his own. 

“Let me guess. You want to give me an out. You want to spout some shit about how we were just in the heat of the moment back there, reunions are emotional, we’ve screwed around a few times, and it’s okay if I don’t want to ‘do anything’ (and here, Eliot let go of Quentin’s hands to make elaborate air quotes) else. Does that about cover it?” Eliot put his hands on his hips. The sun was beginning to set, and it was making Quentin’s white hair look positively bioluminescent. 

“Um, yeah, it does.” Quentin shifted uncomfortably. Eliot cocked his head. 

“Alright, we are going to have to sit down. And have a bit of wine.” Eliot gestured to the two chairs on the balcony and the glasses of wine that had materialized there. They sat. 

“I’m going to tell you some...well, some twisty, mushy feelings about myself. Okay? Ready, set, go. Sadly, in all this time I still haven’t gotten as good at it as I’d like to be.” Eliot swirled his glass of wine and took a sip. “You leaving Fillory--” he stopped to draw breath, aware that his speech was halting and coming out in fractured pieces. “It devastated me. Like, _devastated_ me. Margo will tell you. I was out of my--I couldn’t--well. It just took awhile before I could handle any regular High Kingly duties, suffice it to say.” Eliot kept his tone as casual as he could, not wanting to reopen the Pandora’s Box that was the post-Quentin time in Fillory. “Not that it was all bad,” Eliot acknowledged. “I grew a lot too, you know. Learned a lot about myself and others. But it was terrible.” 

“I’m sorry.” Quentin said simply. Eliot turned to look at him. Quentin’s eyes still looked misty, but there was a steadiness to them.

“What are you sorry for?” Eliot asked, setting his wine down on the table between them. “Ember was being a dick, you can’t help dickery. And I was bound here and all, otherwise I would have followed you through right away, but that took time to figure out.” 

“I’m sorry I played a part in causing you pain.” Quentin’s voice was clear and sure. Eliot stared at him. Jesus, he really had changed. Old Quentin would have shrunk away from claiming any responsibility, and in truth, Eliot saw some of himself in Quentin that way and was drawn to him for that in the early days of their acquaintance. But now, this overt facing-up to playing a part in another human’s suffering, even though it was involuntary, ugh, the gallantry of it all made Eliot unsure as to whether he wanted to swoon on a fainting couch or throw up. Perhaps a little of both. 

“Well, thanks, I guess,” Eliot drew his legs up and hugged his arms around them, staring out at the sun making its slow descent on the horizon. He drew in breath to say something else, but Quentin was suddenly taking up most of his visual field. The white-haired magician was smaller than Eliot by at least 6 inches, in his humble estimation, but still managed to completely crowd Eliot’s vision. Quentin straddled him for the second time that say, and cupped Eliot’s face in his hands. 

“I don’t plan on leaving you again. Can you live with that?” Quentin’s eyes bored into Eliot’s, and Eliot quickly swatted away fantasies of nights in their old age spent on this balcony. That was definitely too many feelings.

But then, Quentin kissed him, and Eliot had an awfully hard time marshalling his feelings in the efficient way that he usually did. Quentin pulled back after a moment. 

“I can live with that,” Eliot said, a little breathless. “I can live with it, you fucking nerd, I don’t think I would live otherwise.” 

And then, Eliot gave himself over to pure sensation, exploring Quentin’s mouth with his own, cataloguing every feeling he possibly could in relation to the impossible, white-haired man on top of him. They came up for air, briefly, and Eliot decided this would be an excellent time to find the spot on Quentin’s neck that he had happened upon on the staircase earlier. 

The noise that escaped Quentin’s throat a few moments later, a sound caught between vulnerability and a shameless, hedonistic joy, let Eliot know that he had found it. That sound floated up on the slight breeze that was mussing their hair, and Eliot thought that he might possibly be able to stay like this forever.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for joining us on High King and Bi King cruises. more chapters are forthcoming. if u have enjoyed your time on this ship, please leave a comment below, it is immensely encouraging and helps me feel like i'm with other fans with feels.

**Author's Note:**

> Please comment if you enjoyed this. It's literal sustenance. Love u byee


End file.
